


To Each Their Own

by mousecookie



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: M/M, One Shot Collection, Originally Posted on Tumblr, in no particular order
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-01
Updated: 2020-04-08
Packaged: 2021-02-28 12:08:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22969771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mousecookie/pseuds/mousecookie
Summary: A series of stand-alone oneshots, drabbles, and ficlets.  Formerly scattered on my tumblr, gradually being collected here.Titles: 1) In Flore Veritas; 2) Desperate Times, Desperate Measures; 3) Buttercup; 4) Laboratory Trials; 5) No, I thought of you.
Relationships: Cisco Ramon/Earth-2 Harrison "Harry" Wells
Comments: 12
Kudos: 73





	1. In Flore Veritas

**Author's Note:**

> From a tumblr ask meme, prompt: “I think I’m in love with you, and that scares the crap out of me”, requested by Terrie.

Cisco was acting cagey.

Cisco was acting cagey, and it was driving Harry _nuts_. Cisco was always looking at Harry when he thought no one could see. Always getting tongue-tied when Harry got close in the workshop. Always sucking on those damn lollipops. And, okay, that last one wasn’t really Cisco’s fault. He’d said on more than one occasion that he ate more candy when he was stressed. This, however, left Harry with the question of what Cisco was stressed _about_ that he was raiding his Atomic Superpop drawer so often, and Harry decided he’d assign the blame squarely back on Cisco for being so talkative _except_ about the thing Harry was most perplexed and infuriated by. 

Harry was a little hurt by it, if he was being honest with himself. After the Thinker, he’d made his feelings about as clear as he could make them. He’d told the whole group point blank that he loved them, and it was true, but he’d been speaking to Cisco most of all. Cisco should have no reason to not share whatever was bothering him. Harry would sooner blunt his own rough edges than hurt Cisco.

Perhaps it was good that there wasn’t a whole lot of spare time for Harry to think about it. Even a few years after The Thinker, the heroes of Central City were still unearthing objects that had been altered by dark matter-infused shrapnel the satellite crash. Meta tech was at worst a menace, and at best, an absurd inconvenience. 

There was a fountain pen that transformed writing into sensational purple prose. 

A frying pan that would incinerate anything put into it.

And then, there was the potted plant, and it was the most disruptive of all. This potted plant had been in a courthouse during the satellite explosion, and struck by dark matter right as a witness was being sworn in for testimony. Between the dark matter and the words _‘to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth’_ washing over it, the little pot of red and pink begonias had acquired the intriguing effect of compelling true words from anyone in close proximity. 

Needless to say, this was a highly impactful object to have in a court of law. The trials held at the Virginia Newell Courthouse were the source of a great deal of scandal (“Judge admits to accepting bribes! Defendant confesses his secret zucchini bread recipe is stolen from a cooking website! Prosecutor confesses deep desire to run away to the circus!”) before the place finally caught the attention of Team Flash.

Such an object was not terribly alarming, given the team’s experience with much more insidious objects. They would simply acquire it, find a way to neutralize it, and move on.

Iris infiltrated the courthouse using her press badge to explain her presence, and hid the plant in a large handbag.

“I really love the way you don’t care that I can’t cook,” she told Barry as she deposited the plant in the lab.

“Of course I don’t care,” Barry smiled at her.

They made lovey eyes at each other while Harry, Cisco, and Caitlin examined the pot of begonias as if it was a bomb rather than a floral arrangement.

“We could just… not water it?” Caitlin suggested. “By the way, Cisco, I ate your hot pockets.”

“I knew it!” Cisco hissed.

“Soil’s bone dry already,” Iris replied, tearing her focus away from Barry. “I don’t think it needs water to survive anymore.”

“An immortal truth plant,” Cisco summarized warily, taking a half step back. “Great.”

“What if we cut it up?” Barry said.

“Then you have multiple sections of immortal truth plant,” Cisco sighed. “Which could be dispersed and cause even more trouble.”

“I’m glad I came back to this Earth,” Harry said. Then he frowned. “I didn’t mean to say that.”

“Aw, it’s good to have you here too, Harry,” Iris replied, giving him a nudge.

“I’m going to see if I can make a… nullifying spray,” Cisco said in a rush, and backed away from the table. 

He was back thirty minutes later with a squeeze bottle and a determined expression.

“Alright, let’s defuse this truth bomb.”

He sprayed the plant liberally with a substance that shimmered slightly in the overhead fluorescent lights.

Everyone stared at the begonias.

“Did it work?” Cisco asked, squinting.

Harry shrugged, then asked, unthinkingly. “Well, what’s something you wouldn’t want us to know?”

“I think I’m in love with you, and it scares the crap out of me.” Cisco said. Then he clapped both hands over his mouth, eyes wide in pure horror.

Everyone stared.

Harry stared, in particular. The tectonic plates of his worldview were rearranging. His lips moved. “Guess… it’s still working…?”

Cisco continued to look as if he wished the world would swallow him up whole, and save him from his humiliation. He squeezed his eyes shut, then opened them again. 

“Right. Right, so,” he stammered as he tried to remember how to human correctly, “I’ll just go… back to the drawing board.”

He fled.

Everyone looked at Harry instead. He coughed.

“I’m going to go… help Ramon.” And then he left, feeling the eyes of everyone on him.

Cisco was busy making a racket in the lab when Harry arrived, slamming tools on tables and hefting large boxes as he searched for supplies.

“Need some help?” Harry asked, hands stuffed in his pockets.

Cisco, who had his back turned as he reached high on a shelf, froze as he recognized Harry’s voice. 

“I’m good.” His voice was a thready squeak, and he cleared his throat. “I’m good. All good here.” He didn’t turn around. 

Harry sighed. “Ramon…” 

Cisco continued to rifle through boxes, refusing to turn around. His shoulders were hunched protectively.

“Ramon,” Harry tried again. “I just wanted to say–”

“I don’t need to hear it,” Cisco interrupted him. “It’s fine. We can pretend it didn’t happen.”

“No,” Harry insisted. “I… I wanted to say I’m… sorry. I didn’t mean to force you to admit… what you did.” Before the Thinking Cap, he might not have thought to apologize first. But he knew better now. He would show Cisco that.

“I said it’s fine,” Cisco snapped, apparently not caring about Harry’s new leaf. There was a metallic clang as he jostled a piece of equipment. “We can all forget about it. Anyway, I have some work to do. I should get on it.”

Harry ignored the implied dismissal, and ran a hand through his hair in frustration. He might be more in touch with his emotions now, but it didn’t mean the words came any easier. He’d always been better with expressing himself through physical action. Knocking beakers off tables, throwing erasers. He’d have to channel the same focus for a more tender purpose.

He approached Cisco cautiously, like he was afraid one wrong move would send Cisco into another flight. And with Cisco’s powers… if he didn’t want to be found, he wouldn’t be.

“Ramon… _Cisco,_ ” Harry said.

Cisco crossed his arms and glared at the shelf in front of him. He flinched when Harry gently laid a hand on his shoulder - a familiar gesture, but now carrying more weight than it had ever had before - and turned Cisco to face him. 

“Cisco,” Harry said again, moving to cup Cisco’s cheek. Those sullen brown eyes were suddenly wide again, and fixed on Harry with a mixture of fear and hope. It wasn’t hard, then, for Harry to admit it. “I’m scared, too,” he said.

“You– what?” Cisco choked out, confused, even as he turned his face into Harry’s palm like a man taking a last breath of air before sinking underwater.

“We’re in the same boat, you and me,” Harry murmured. A half-step forward took him comfortably within Cisco’s space. He never could stay far from Cisco for long. He’d crossed the multiverse to stay close.

Cisco’s fists clenched at his sides. “You can’t mean that.”

“Why not?” Harry grunted, a little insulted. “I’m in love with you, and terrified about it. That makes us a pair.” And when Cisco’s posture sagged, when hope began to overtake disbelief in his eyes, Harry gathered the courage to make his proposal. “So… Why not be scared, together?” he asked.

A nervous laugh escaped Cisco. “When you look at me like that, I can almost believe you mean it.”

“Believe it,” Harry said, and kissed him.

Some time later, both of them breathless and flushed, Cisco remembered the root of the whole situation.

“The stupid flowers,” he said from his seat on the lab table. “We gotta figure out what to do with them.”

“Why the rush?” Harry said, busy nosing a line from Cisco’s ear to his collarbone.

“Because… because.” Cisco sighed, unable to muster up a compelling reason with Harry being so… mmm… _distracting_. “Oh! I know!”

“What?” Harry groused.

“We can _Beauty and the Beast_ that shit,” Cisco exclaimed. "Crystal bell jar. Meta-dampening beam refracting infinitely within it. Bye bye truthiness.”

Harry pulled back to look at him. “Brilliant.”

Cisco grinned. “Let’s do it.”

"Later," Harry hummed, leaning in again.

Cisco found he wasn't inclined to argue.


	2. Desperate Times, Desperate Measures

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From a tumblr ask meme, prompt - “If we get caught I’m blaming you”, requested by purplecyborgnewt.

Cisco’s lungs were burning. He didn’t regret failing high school gym class; the place had been a hunting ground for his bullies, and he had been much better served by hiding behind the 7th wing with his comic books. However, he did wish that as an adult he’d dragged his body to the gym for cardio a few times a week. His meta transformation into Vibe hadn’t magically granted him perfect fitness like it had Barry, and right now, as he and Harry were fleeing the sentries of a shady black market organization, he was really wishing it had.

Of course Harry, the asshole, was as smooth and effortless as a goddamn machine as he ran at Cisco’s elbow. Cisco wasn’t sure the man had even broken a sweat. Harry could have outpaced him easily by now - could have eaten up the corridors with strides from those long, long legs - but he hadn’t. And that knowledge was something. Cisco wasn’t sure what, but it made him feel warm. Harry wasn’t going to leave him alone.

Harry, oblivious to Cisco’s warm fuzzy musings, naturally opened his mouth and ruined all of it.

“If we get caught, I’m blaming you,” Harry hissed as they hurtled around a dark dark corner.

“How was I supposed to know,” Cisco paused to gasp a hot lungful of air, “that they’d have meta dampeners?!”

“Your powers include _tactile precognition_ ,” Harry griped back. “ _That’s_ how you’re supposed to have known!”

“I don’t— _have_ my powers!” Cisco returned heatedly, breathing hard. “That’s the whole point— of meta dampeners!”

“Stop talking and run so we can get out of range,” Harry said in that infuriatingly even tone. He may as well have been having a chat in an elevator for how much their pace affected his breathing.

Cisco wanted to make a biting retort, but he had to agree Harry was right. He could hear the shouts of minions behind them, and the occasional sizzle of laser fire (because of course the enemy had laser guns) striking the walls behind them. Every moment was crucial.

So they ran.

They ran and ran until finally, Cisco felt a sensation like his mind was taking a deep breath of fresh air, and he knew they were out of the dampening field. At exactly the same moment, Harry’s elbow brushed his arm, and Cisco nearly tripped and fell down over the strength of the vibe that hit him.

_They were running. They careened through a door and into a normal city alleyway. Cisco punched a breach into the air. They started to jump through._

_There was a sizzle of laser fire._

_Harry’s cry of pain._

_Harry falling._

_“No–!”_

Cisco stumbled, but remained upright thanks to Harry seizing his arm.

“Alright?” Harry asked urgently as he half-dragged Cisco along.

“Yeah,” Cisco gasped. “Just a vibe.”

“What of?” Harry asked.

They careened around a corner, and there was a horribly familiar door.

“Shit!” Cisco swore.

“What?!” Harry pressed, but there was no time. Cisco couldn’t explain.

“Do you trust me?” Cisco asked instead, breathing ragged.

“Stupid question,” Harry retorted.

“Okay– just trust me– and roll with it!” Cisco said as they crashed through the door.

As soon as they were in the alleyway from his vibe, Cisco shoved Harry into a nook in the brick wall and climbed him like a tree, forcing Harry to catch him with strong hands hooked under his thighs.

“What are you doing?” Harry hissed, even as he supported Cisco’s weight securely, doing as he’d been asked and rolling with whatever Cisco did.

“Changing the future,” Cisco replied, and kissed him.

It was all electric desperation, and Harry responded like a live wire with teeth and tongue. With his stupidly strong arms, he turned and put Cisco’s back against the wall just as they heard the door bang open again behind them. It was very _Harry_ to put himself between Cisco and the enemy, and Cisco took a second to be exasperated while he moaned and tangled his fingers in Harry's hair.

Somehow, miraculously, their pursuers took off down the alleyway, ignoring them both completely. The door banged closed. There was silence. 

Reluctantly, Cisco pulled back from the kiss. A thin strand of saliva connected his bottom lip to Harry’s, which should have been disgusting, but Cisco could only find maddeningly hot. Harry’s pupils were dilated and his chest was heaving. This second fact was particularly intriguing, since Cisco had just witnessed the man running without so much as hitch in his breath.

“Are they gone?” Harry panted. His arms stayed rock steady, strong as a fortress as they held Cisco up. One hand was planted firmly on Cisco’s ass, and that stayed exactly where it was, too. His eyes were on Cisco’s lips.

For a moment, Cisco wanted to lie, so that they’d have an excuse to keep kissing. 

But Harry would see through that in a heartbeat.

So instead, Cisco wiped his mouth, cleared his throat, and nodded. Harry carefully set him on his feet. Cisco cleared his throat again and shifted, wishing there was a less obvious way to adjust his jeans.

“Why don’t you make us a breach out of here?” Harry said, gaze still hungry in a way that made Cisco’s stomach flip.

The heightened of adrenaline of the last few moments made it easy for Cisco to summon a glowing portal.

“Perfect,” Harry murmured.

In one smooth movement, he was kissing Cisco again, and pulling them both through the breach. Cisco grabbed him right back and let him do it.


	3. Buttercup

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A short ficlet done back in 2018 for HarriscoFest, prompt "buttercup". I figured a Princess Bride discussion was mandatory.

“Oh _nuh-uh_ , Harry. You’redefinitely the Buttercup in this equation.” Cisco waved an illustrative hand between them from where he lounged in a cortex swivel chair, feet up on the console. “You’re always telling me to do stuff and I indulge your annoying requests only out of deep love.” He punctuated this by dramatically clutching at his heart.

“I don’t see how I can be anything other than the Man in Black,” Harry replied from his own chair across the room, gesturing down at his black long-sleeve shirt, black jeans, and black boots.

“Hmmmyeah okay, point,” conceded Cisco. “But who’s the one with the stellar combat skills here?” He wiggled his fingers in a vague imitation of a Vibe-blast.

“Me,” Harry countered immediately, miming a pulse rifle and pretending to take a shot at Cisco with one eye closed. “Also, you’re the pretty one.”

“Hey!” squawked Cisco. “While I absolutely don’t deny that, this man is also ruggedly handsome, thank you very much. And wears a bangin’ leather jacket.”

“I’ve banged you in that leather jacket.”

“That’s not what’s under discussion here!” Cisco jabbed a finger. “You don’t know what they were like in the sack.”

“Are you suggesting-”

“I’m _suggesting_ that you’re Buttercup.” Cisco folded his arms. “Buttercup gets rescued. I’ve had to rescue you from Zoom’s evil clutches, Grodd’s prison, that fucking thinking cap-” he ticked them off on his fingers. “Buttercup gets rescued. You’re Buttercup. Just admit it, Harry, you know I’m right.”

Harry smirked, eyes twinkling. “As you wish.”


	4. Laboratory Trials

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another teensy ficlet done for HarriscoFest 2018, for the prompt "You've given me a balance". I challenged myself to use dialogue only.

“You’ve given me a balance.”

“Yep.”

“…You’ve given me a balance when I _specifically_ asked for a hydrometer.”

“We can’t always get what we want, Harry.”

“Really, Ramon? You’re sulking by being a lazy lab assistant?”

“Hold up, _assistant–_?!”

“You’re supposed to be helping me, ergo, assistant.”

“Listen here old man–”

“Age cracks are a weak insult.”

“Listen here, _you old man_. I’m not your assistant, this is _my lab!”_

“You’re cute when you’re angry.”

“Ho _ly_ Hannah, I can’t deal with you right now.”

“Sounds like you need a balance.”

“Yeah, well you need a good kick up the-”

“And I disagree with you, you know.”

“About _what?_ ”

“Sometimes we do get what we want.”

“Yeah? Well you’re not ge- _mmfff!!_ ”

“ _Mmm_.”

“…”

“…”

_**“…”** _

_**“…”** _

“ _Mm_ _nn_ , mm, okay, you may have a point.”

“Good. Now get me a hydrometer.”

“I _swear to god_ , Harry–”


	5. No, I thought of you.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ficlet for AStarlitSunflower, based on a post about a Portrait of a Lady on Fire quote: ["you dreamed of me?” “no, i thought of you” is just literally insane. it throws everything out the window. the yearning, the hoping, the wishing. it’s about loving someone on PURPOSE. loving someone INTENTIONALLY.]

“I liked visiting my Earth,” Harry said as he sipped his coffee in the STAR Labs break room. “But you weren’t there. Well, at least not literally.”

"You dreamed of me?” Cisco teased, sending an exaggerated coy look over his shoulder as he refilled his own mug.

“No, I thought of you,” Harry said, his gaze very direct. “Often.” 

Cisco flushed to the roots of his hair, bravado evaporating. “Oh.”

“The coffee’s not going into your mug anymore,” Harry said, smug and not helpful in the slightest as he pointed to where Jitters dark roast was about to overflow the spill cache of the coffee machine.

“Shit!” Cisco hastily put down the coffee pot and chased the overflow with paper towels.

When he straightened up, Harry was still looking at him with quiet intensity. Cisco wrestled some composure into existence, and sauntered over to plop himself in Harry’s lap. Two could play this game.

“Oh yeah? So what did you think about me?” 

Harry slid his coffee mug onto the table and buried his nose in Cisco’s hair, his arms snaking around Cisco to haul him closer. “That I missed you,” he said, voice muffled by dark curls. “That I wanted to hold you, just like this.”

“I’m an inter-dimensional traveler, Harry, I can show up anytime you want,” Cisco replied, though his insides warmed. “You’d just need to text me.”

Harry swept Cisco’s hair aside and began a methodical trail of kisses across his collarbone and up to his jaw. “Hmm. If I texted you every time I thought about you, you’d never get anything done.”

“I think I could accomplish a lot of things,” Cisco retorted, grinning. “I think you might even like some of them.”

Harry smiled against his neck. “I’ll remember that.”

He nipped at Cisco’s chin and nuzzled in for a proper kiss. 

“I’m glad you came back,” Cisco said when they parted. “I think about you, too. There’s no one to throw my tools in the lab when you’re gone. And after I went to all the trouble of getting carbide-reinforced beakers.”

“I can throw some things now that I’m here,” Harry said generously.

“Good,” Cisco laughed, then shrieked as Harry stood up with Cisco still in his arms. “Harry! No, wait, I need my coffee!”

“Too late, need to throw stuff. You said so,” Harry replied seriously, turning sideways to fit them both through the doorway as he walked.

“Nooo!” Cisco protested dramatically, reaching back like he could bring the coffee mug to him with the Force. “Coffee-- my real true love-- I can’t believe it had to end like this!”

Harry grinned and kept walking. 


End file.
